The 12 Most Heartwarming Things to Watch on Netflix This Winter

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022, PG-13)​

The middle chapter of writer-director Rian Johnson’s giddy murder-mystery trilogy stars Daniel Craig, 57, having the time of his life as the Southern-dandy sleuth Benoit Blanc. The first Knives Out focused on a New England family jockeying to inherit their dead patriarch’s fortune. This sun-kissed sequel shifts the setting to a Greek island where an eccentric billionaire (Edward Norton, 56) welcomes a group of old friends to play a game of detective (which quickly becomes very real). The ensemble cast (including AARP's Movies for Grownups best actress, television, nominee Kathryn Hahn, 52, Kate Hudson, Janelle Monáe and Dave Bautista, 56) is a blast to hang out with for a couple hours. Which, come to think of it, is just enough time for Craig’s Blanc to figure out whodunit.  

Watch it: Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery

Did you know: Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery is nominated for a Movies for Grownups award this year? 

How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (2003, PG-13)​

Nothing goes down easier — or warms the heart faster — than a bubbly-as-champagne rom-com. This underrated screwball gem is a perfect example. Kate Hudson stars as an advice columnist for a women’s magazine assigned a story about the behaviors that drive men away in a relationship. To put her theory to the test, she seeks out a hunky guinea pig (Matthew McConaughey, 56), a smooth ad exec who has a hidden agenda of his own. Sure, Shakespeare was cranking out these sorts of mistaken-identity stories 400 years ago, but they worked like gangbusters then and still work like gangbusters today.  ​

Watch it: How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days

Downton Abbey (2019, PG)​

When it comes to cozy fireside entertainment, the Brits know exactly what they’re doing. And between the upper-crust dramatics of Bridgerton and The Crown, Netflix has you more than covered. That said, we prefer Julian Fellowes’ film — a sequel to his hit series — about the Crawley family and the equally incident-prone staff who cater to them. It’s the perfect comfort watch, from the envy-inducing Edwardian manor with its emerald gardens and dark-paneled studies to those seemingly bottomless snifters of brandy.

Watch it: Downton Abbey

A League of Their Own (1992, PG)​

Nothing spells feel-good quite like T-O-M H-A-N-K-S. And this Penny Marshall comedy about the Rockford Peaches, an all-female baseball team during WWII, and their perpetually hungover manager, Jimmy Dugan (Hanks, 69), is as satisfying as a box of Cracker Jack on a summer’s day at the ballpark. The Peaches’ roster includes such all-stars as Madonna, 67, Rosie O'Donnell, 63, and Geena Davis, 69. Inspired by the real-life All-American Girls Professional Baseball League launched in 1943, when male players were off at war, A League of Their Own manages to feel light and breezy while saying something deeper about women finding their voices and a sense of sisterhood through sports.

Watch it: A League of Their Own

High Plains Drifter (1973, R)​

If you’re anything like my dad, throwing on a Western is your idea of comfort-food escapism. Netflix doesn’t have the deepest library of movies that predate the Reagan era, but it does offer this Clint Eastwood classic. Eastwood, 95, is at his squinting, shoot-first-ask-questions-later best as a mystery man who rides into a remote town that’s being terrorized by a gang of ruthless gunslingers. The final half hour of High Plains Drifter goes to some bonkers, unexpected places, but it gets my dad’s seal of approval, which I can tell you is not easily earned.

Watch it: High Plains Drifter

Plus three bingeable TV series … 

Arrested Development

This delightfully unhinged sitcom about the hilariously dysfunctional Bluth clan may be the funniest — and most underrated — show of the 2000s. Jason Bateman, 56, is deadpan perfection as the only responsible member of a family that doesn’t know how to get out of its own way. Everyone in the cast, from the late Jessica Walter to Will Arnett, 55, is 24-karat gold. The same goes for Ron Howard, 71, as the series’ mild-mannered narrator. Those new to this series will want to clear out the rest of the afternoon. It’s that addictive. 

Watch it: Arrested Development

The Great British Baking Show

If you haven’t binged this reality contest yet, what are you waiting for? Seasons 5 to 13 of the feel-good juggernaut are just a click away. The premise: A dozen or so amateur bakers from every corner of the U.K. assemble under a tent in the English countryside to whip up cakes, tarts and whatever other treats the judges assign them. Half of the show’s immense joy is watching these hopefuls measure and mix their assigned recipes; the other is the selfless camaraderie they all seem to share in their quest to be each week’s top baker. There’s something decidedly un-American about this show: The competitors aren’t all that competitive with one another. They just love to bake for the sake of baking.

Watch it: The Great British Baking Show

Our Planet II​

Netflix offers more than a few fantastic nature series narrated by the one and only Sir David Attenborough, 99. His jolly, sandpaper voice is a global treasure, as is his lifelong mission to make the planet feel not only smaller but also like something we need to protect. With stunning wildlife photography and enlightening nuggets about the ins and outs of Earth’s strange animal kingdom, this is the rare program that manages to be educational without being dry. Whether waxing rhapsodic about polar bears, Siberian tigers or the bizarre creatures lurking at the bottom of the ocean, Attenborough makes the world feel deservedly wondrous.

Watch it: Our Planet II